Understanding and Quantifying Climatic Patterns and Hydrologic Budgets in High Mountain Asia Using Remote-Sensing and Field Data

Abstract:

Monitoring high-altitude catchments and understanding their water budgets remains a challenge, despite recent advantages in observational and modeling realms. This presentation synthesizes previous and new findings and highlights challenges with specific focus on remote-sensing data, their validation and processing. Research examples covering various spatial and temporal scales will be given from western, central, and eastern High Mountain Asia (HMA). The following three key points will be addressed: First, spatial patterns and magnitudes of climatic gradients along and across strike of HMA will be analyzed. This includes, for example, quantifying the differences between the high-elevation parts of western HMA that are dominated by winter snowfall and the central Himalaya that have a larger summer-monsoon rainfall component. Second, an assessment of the impact of climatic gradients on hydrologic budgets will be presented. Third, an attempt is made to assess an often overlooked, but potentially very important process: What is the impact of rare hydrometeorologic events on annual water budgets and how may they impact decadal water resources?